Electrochemical reduction of quinones: interfacing experiment and theory for defining effective radii of redox moieties.

Using cyclic voltammetry, we examined the dependence of the reduction potentials of six quinones on the concentration of the supporting electrolyte. An increase in the electrolyte concentration, resulting in an increase in the solution polarity, caused positive shifts of the reduction potentials. We ascribed the observed changes in the potentials to the dependence of the solvation energy of the quinones and their anions on the media polarity. Analysis of the reduction potentials, using the Born solvation energy equation, yielded unfeasibly small values for the effective radii of the quinone species, that is, the experimentally obtained effective radii were up to 4-fold smaller than the radii of the solvation cavities that we calculated for the quinones. The nonspherical shapes of the quinones, along with the uneven charge density distribution in their anions, encompassed the underlying reasons for the discrepancies between the obtained experimental and theoretical values for the radii of these redox species. The generalized Born approach, which does not treat the solvated species as single spheres, provided means for addressing this discrepancy and yielded effective radii that were relatively close to the measured values.

Kinetics of bacterial fluorescence staining with 3,3'-diethylthiacyanine.

For more than a century, colorimetric and fluorescence staining have been the foundation of a broad range of key bioanalytical techniques. The dynamics of such staining processes, however, still remains largely unexplored. We investigated the kinetics of fluorescence staining of two gram-negative and two gram-positive species with 3,3'-diethylthiacyanine (THIA) iodide. An increase in the THIA fluorescence quantum yield, induced by the bacterial dye uptake, was the principal reason for the observed emission enhancement. The fluorescence quantum yield of THIA depended on the media viscosity and not on the media polarity, which suggested that the microenvironment of the dye molecules taken up by the cells was restrictive. The kinetics of fluorescence staining did not manifest a statistically significant dependence neither on the dye concentration, nor on the cell count. In the presence of surfactant additives, however, the fluorescence-enhancement kinetic patterns manifested species specificity with statistically significant discernibility.

Fluorescence enhancement of warfarin induced by interaction with beta-cyclodextrin.

Warfarin is the most common agent used for control and prevention of venous as well as arterial thromboembolism (blood clots). In aqueous media, warfarin forms inclusion complexes with a family of cyclic oligosaccharides, alpha, beta, gamma-cyclodextrins (CD). The formation of these complexes results in enhancement of the fluorescence of warfarin. Such spectroscopic changes offer a venue for the development of bioanalytical methodologies for warfarin quantification in biological liquids. We characterized the photophysical properties of warfarin in solvents with varying polarity and viscosity. The fluorescence quantum yield of warfarin correlated: (1) strongly with the solvent viscosity (R = 0.979) and (2) weakly with the solvent polarity (R = 0.118). These findings indicate that it is the change of the viscosity, rather than polarity, of the microenvironment that causes the fluorescence enhancement of warfarin upon binding to beta-CD. Utilizing the observed fluorescence enhancement in fluorescence titration measurements, the binding constants of warfarin to beta-CD were obtained (2.6 x 10(2) M(-1)-3.7 x 10(2) M(-1)). Using multivariable linear analysis, we extracted the stoichiometry of warfarin-beta-CD interaction (1:1).